Weekly Free Instant Tournament - Feb 11, 2022 - Board 1

I am starting a new set of posts this week, discussing boards from the Weekly Free Instant Tournament on BBO. You might find these posts more meaningful if you try playing the boards yourself first. You have until Thursday of this week to do that. Just go to the "Solitaire" section on BBO and click on "Weekly Free Instant Tournament." Please comment below if you had an interesting result or if you think of some play or inference I missed. 

You can also get a different perspective by viewing Pete Holland's video. He plays the tournament in real time with a running commentary. His video will be on BBO on Tuesday and can also be found on YouTube. I'm sure he will have different points to make, since we don't think about the game the same way. For one thing, I have never once played a hand where I was even alert to the possibility of scoring the beer card.

Board 1
Neither vulnerable

♠ Q 9  ♥ A 10  ♦ A Q 6  ♣ Q 10 8 5 3 2

Partner opens with one heart and I bid two clubs. Partner bids two hearts. This is a catch-all bid in the robots' methods and does not guarantee a sixth heart. Partner might be balanced without a stopper in one of the unbid suits. Or he might be four-five in the majors, since a two spade bid by him would show extras.

My choices are two notrump or three clubs. Three clubs shows the sixth club, but it's not clear how important that is. And it requires partner to bid past three notrump to show club support. Two notrump leaves room for partner to show support by bidding three clubs. Another advantage of two notrump is that it may right-side notrump. Both my spade and diamond holdings suggest notrump may play better from my side. 

I bid two notrump, and partner bids three spades, showing four spades. Arguably this should promise a sixth heart. I wouldn't bid two notrump with four spades, so with a 4-5-2-2 or 4-5-3-1 opener has no reason to introduce the suit and should simply raise to three notrump. Choosing three spades instead suggests he has reason to suspect notrump is the wrong strain. But I have no confidence partner knows this. I would bid four hearts if I trusted partner. But opposite this partner I think it’s better to bid three notrump. This could conceivably be the right contract even if partner has six hearts, and it is almost surely right if he doesn't. 

I bid three notrump, which ends the auction. West leads the diamond three.

	NORTH Robot ♠ A K J 4 ♥ Q 9 7 3 2 ♦ J 8 ♣ J 6
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ Q 9 ♥ A 10 ♦ A Q 6 ♣ Q 10 8 5 3 2

West	North	East	South
Robot	Robot	Robot	Phillip
	1 ♥	Pass	2 ♣
Pass	2 ♥	Pass	2 NT
Pass	3 ♠	Pass	3 NT
(All pass)

I'm glad I didn't bid four hearts. This certainly looks like a better contract.

The diamond deuce is missing, so the lead could be from a five-card suit or even from a doubleton. I have seven tricks ready to cash, so I need two more. I also need to prevent the opponents from taking three diamond tricks. 

If diamonds are five-three, it could be right to go after hearts, attempting to establish two tricks while losing the lead only once. But that’s unlikely to work, and, if it doesn’t, it could result in my going down two or more, since it establishes heart tricks for them they won't get if I attack clubs instead.

Attacking clubs, assuming I don’t run into bad luck in the club suit, will work if diamonds are four-four or if I can tangle the opponents' communications so they don't take all their diamond tricks. And, if it doesn’t work, I rate to go down only one. So my plan will be to work on clubs.

What should I play from dummy at trick one? The eight is right if West has the ten and nine, a 25% chance. It might also be right if East plays the king from king-ten or king-nine. When will he do that? He will do that if he thinks it's possible I have queen doubleton. But he should be able to tell from the lead that I don't. He might also do that if it looks right to win the first trick and shift to a different suit. But this doesn't look a deal where that's the right approach. So I'll assume he will always insert the ten or nine from those holdings. Playing low, then, is right 25% of the time.

For the jack to be right, West must have the king, a 50% chance. But that's not sufficient. Even if the jack holds, if East wins the first club trick and plays a diamond through, playing jack will have gained nothing. So if I expect that to happen more than half the time, playing low is the percentage play. Will it happen more than half the time?  If I win the diamond jack and play a small club from dummy, it might not be obvious to East that he needs to hop, especially if he has the king and not the ace. In fact, it might be impossible for him to hop, since West might have both honors. 

Let's make the assumption that East will never hop with the king alone, probably a fair assumption against this East. In that case, I will lose the first club to West whenever West has ace-king or the ace alone and will lose it to East whenever East has ace-king or ace alone, in other words, half the time. This makes it a tossup which card to play at trick one. But, in fact, sometimes East will duck the club even when he has the ace. He's not looking at my hand after all. That possibility makes it percentage to play the jack.

I play the jack, and East covers with the king. I see no reason to win this trick. I don’t see any reason to duck it either—unless perhaps the lead was from a doubleton. But a general principle of declarer play is that any time it can’t gain to win a trick, you should duck. Sometimes the opponents make a mistake when you leave them on play. Sometimes you tighten up the end position for a squeeze you didn’t see coming. Sometimes you simply get more information. In general, good things seem to happen when you follow this principle. So I duck.

East continues with the diamond deuce. Since East has the deuce, I now know West began with three or four diamonds. Which card should I win with? From West’s perspective, the queen is the card I’m known to hold, so the queen is more deceptive. From East’s perspective, the ace is more deceptive. If I play the queen and it holds, East will know I have the ace also. But if I play the ace, his partner might have the queen. 

So my right play depends upon which defender I want to keep in the dark. If West has three diamonds, he will need to hop on the first club. East, on the other hand, has no critical decisions to make. Since West is one I want to conceal information from, the queen is the right play. How will playing the queen persuade West to duck the first round of clubs? I have no idea. Probably it won’t. Like my duck it trick one, it’s just good technique. You want to conceal information from the opponent who will make the critical decision. 

I play the diamond queen, and West follows with the four. I play the club three. West plays the seven, and East wins dummy’s jack with the king. I expect East to continue diamonds, but he surprises me by leading the club four. Hmm. It appears East had five diamonds and West failed to hop with the club ace to lead his last diamond. Did my play of the diamond queen work for some reason?

I play the club queen, and West takes his ace. I have the rest. Making four.

	NORTH Robot ♠ A K J 4 ♥ Q 9 7 3 2 ♦ J 8 ♣ J 6
WEST Robot ♠ 10 3 ♥ K J 8 5 ♦ 9 5 4 3 ♣ A 9 7		EAST Robot ♠ 8 7 6 5 2 ♥ 6 4 ♦ K 10 7 2 ♣ K 4
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ Q 9 ♥ A 10 ♦ A Q 6 ♣ Q 10 8 5 3 2

Diamonds were four-four. Perhaps East thought his partner had led a three-card suit, so continuing diamonds would not be productive. What was he playing me for instead? Maybe something like

♠ Q x  ♥ A x  ♦ A Q 6 5  ♣ A 10 8 x x ?

Who knows? It’s not important. What’s important is that, if I had won the first trick, East surely would have continued diamonds on winning the club king. By ducking, I created the opportunity for him to construct a layout where something else was more attractive, and he did. 

Plus 430 is worth 100%. No other declarer in three notrump ducked the first trick, so East always continued diamonds when he gained the lead. It’s nice when proper technique is rewarded.

Some statements I made earlier proved to be wrong. "East... has no critical decisions to make," I said.  Wrong. "You want to conceal information from the hand who will make the critical decision," I said. Wrong again. Advertising my double diamond stopper made abandoning diamonds more attractive. Had I made the deceptive play of the ace, East might have continued diamonds. While I will happily take credit for ducking at trick one, I can't take credit for the play of the diamond queen. It was a lucky accident. I chose the right play for the wrong reason.